The relationship between red-tailed hawks and gophers is pretty straightforward: hawks eat gophers. Here’s one on the back lawn, shot through the (closed) sliding glass door, right as the sun was going down Saturday evening. I couldn’t risk opening the door and frightening the hawk off its kill, so the images are even softer than they would normally be with the light coming from behind the scene. Still, I love hawks and am annoyed by gophers, so I was cheering inside the whole time this little drama was unfolding.
The sequence had extra drama on my side of the lens because my camera battery was completely dead, so I had to sprint into my office and find the charged batteries, swap them out, and run back to the window, all the while hoping the hawk hadn’t left. Thankfully, it hadn’t. It did, however, eventually notice me and take off with the uneaten parts of its dinner; a few of the in-flight shots actually came out!
Way to go hawk! Yay! Love the pics..